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McDonald’s Changes Menu, Woos Chipotle Customers: So Is It a Buy?

Artificial preservatives and high-fructose corn syrup have been dirty words in food culture for a good few years now, and McDonald’s is hoping that their high-profile move away from them will be part of a charm offensive to get more customers to buy some McNuggets.

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McDonald’s return last September to its original Egg McMuffin recipe with butter instead of liquid margarine increased sales by double digits.

Mike Andres, president of McDonald’s United States of America, said the changes to its supply chain had posed challenges but he was pleased with the progress.

The decision to remove artificial preservatives from McNuggets meant changing the cooking oil the nuggets were cooked in, because it had a preservative.

McDonald’s is reacting to a shift in consumer tastes toward healthier, more natural foods and competing with other restaurants that are overhauling their menus to feature items free of processed ingredients.

The menu changes will take about six months to put in place at its restaurants worldwide, including those in Nottingham city centre on Exchange Walk, Clumber Street and Angel Row.

It has also completed a transition to only serve chicken not treated with antibiotics important to human medicine. The company originally set out to achieve its antibiotics chicken commitment by March 2017. All said, the McDonald’s Chicken McNuggets can now be enjoyed with no artificial flavors, colors, or preservatives, continuing a company-wide initiative to answer customer requests for healthier menu items.

McDonald’s isn’t the first to make this shift.

“We are creating a different food culture at McDonald’s”, Andres said.

McDonald’s is debuting new buns without high-fructose corn syrup for an array of its sandwiches. “McDonald’s and its suppliers have worked to identify appropriate alternatives for sustaining broiler flock health while implementing protocols to ensure that animal welfare is not compromised”.

She said that it’s getting easier to persuade suppliers like Tyson Foods to change their practices, however.

The Big Mac seller said previous year that it would start introducing cage-free eggs in its nearly 16,000 restaurants across the USA and Canada in the next decade.

In June McDonald’s also added Tuscan red leaf lettuce and ribbon-cut carrot curls to salads with the freshly prepared premium salads now offering at least two and a half cups of vegetables.

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However, when it comes to the latest tinkering with ingredients, Moss – the author of the New York Times bestseller, “Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us” – doesn’t think they’re going far enough to address the bigger problem of excessive calories. Today, that same focus and care for its food matters more than ever.

Robert Galbraith